"Lost" Machines: Japanese Tsugami Lathes Forge Weapons, Massively Reaching Russian Defense Plants

Products from Japanese corporation Tsugami, which manufactures high-precision metalworking lathes, are reaching Russia by the hundreds.
After the start of the full-scale war, exports of lathes through Chinese suppliers increased dozens of times.
Despite sanctions and trade restrictions imposed by the Japanese government, products from the company, which are critically important for the Russian military-industrial complex, were supplied for $62 million.

"Tsugami equipment is currently not allowed to be supplied to Russia" – writes a manager from Chinese company Suzhou Wugan in response to an inquiry about purchasing a Japanese lathe. But the next sentence changes everything: "We must ensure the safety of delivering Tsugami machines to you."

This correspondence is the result of our own investigation, in which journalists from Trap Aggressor analytical center StateWatch posed as Russian managers of a radar equipment manufacturing enterprise. And this is not an isolated case. According to collected data, in 2024 alone, high-precision Japanese Tsugami lathes worth over $62 million reached Russia through Chinese intermediaries despite sanctions and trade restrictions. These machines are now operating in factories that manufacture components for “Geran” drones, missile guidance systems, and onboard equipment for Russian aviation. Meanwhile, the Japanese corporation has “lost” over 300 lathes, and Chinese traders are ready to “safely” deliver prohibited goods to Moscow. The result – Russian defense plants receive critically important equipment. We explain how this became possible and why goods important to Russian industry, whose flow should have stopped back in 2022, are only gaining popularity.

“We’ll Deliver Safely to Moscow”

Although the Chinese government recently claimed it “strictly controls the export of dual-use goods” to Russia, there is no shortage of companies willing to supply them there. After very quick negotiations with a Chinese distributor on behalf of a Russian company participating in government contracts, we were assured that a Japanese Tsugami lathe would reach Moscow. Moreover, “safely.”

In mid-August 2025, Ukraine’s Presidential Representative for Sanctions Policy Vladyslav Vlasyuk reported that Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry conducted an investigation and discovered that over 300 lathes from manufacturer Tsugami “disappeared” after being sold to seven Chinese companies. According to Japanese authorities, about 30 of these lathes have already been “found” on Russian territory.

However, significantly more could be “found.” According to data obtained by Trap Aggressor, in 2024 alone Russia imported lathes and their components manufactured by Tsugami for over $62 million. We also managed to determine several exact delivery addresses in Russia and which specific factories of the Kremlin’s war machine are using them.

Customer-Oriented Service

Screenshot from the Internet

(Ihor and Yana Domskaya, owners of LLC “Soldrim-SPB”)

According to Suzhou Wugan’s website, the company is also a distributor of Tsugami lathes. As it turned out, ordering a Japanese lathe subject to export control from China doesn’t require special efforts.

Experiment: How to Buy a Prohibited Lathe

We contacted the company, posing as Russian “managers of an enterprise that produces components for surveillance and radar systems within government projects” and asked about a possible purchase.

“First of all, I need information about your company. Since TSUGAMI equipment is currently not allowed to be supplied to Russia,” – the company manager replied.

It would seem that’s the end of it, if not for the next sentence: “We must ensure the safety of delivering TSUGAMI machines to you.”

Later, the company said they couldn’t supply Japanese machines but were ready to send any lathe from Tsugami’s Chinese subsidiary. They sent a catalog from Tsugami Precision Machine Tools (Zhejiang) Co. Ltd. and didn’t require any information about the potential buyer.

Later, the company reported that they couldn't purchase and deliver Japanese machines, but were ready to supply any machine tool from the Chinese division of the Tsugami factory, sent a catalog of Tsugami Precision Machine Tools (Zhejiang) Co., Ltd., and didn't require any information about the potential buyer.

Why Russia Needs Japanese Machine Tools

Virtually all Russian defense industry is built on imported lathes, with the vast majority being products from highly developed countries like the USA, Germany, or Japan. This is because Chinese lathes are not of sufficient quality to perform ultra-precise work. And since Russian military doctrine is built on using missiles, it requires ultra-fine work with integrated circuits and other sensitive weapon components.

Computer Numerically Controlled (CNC) lathes, besides precision, have another advantage – they are completely controlled by computer: the operator loads data, and the lathe repeats the operation with stable precision any number of times. This also reduces personnel requirements, who now don’t need 10-15 years of training. Simply put, Japanese lathes provide exactly what Russian defense cannot ensure within the country: stable micron precision and reliability on small complex parts.

Japan is currently the only Asian country that has joined anti-Russian sanctions and directly prohibits the export of certain goods to Russia, including lathes. Criminal sanctions are possible for violating trade rules: up to 5 years imprisonment or up to 10 million yen fine.

Therefore, most companies don’t take risks and choose a roundabout way – they buy lathes from this corporation at Tsugami’s Chinese division.

Trade at Full Speed

Obviously, with the start of the full-scale invasion and increased volume of weapons production, the need for machine tools and their spare parts has only grown. For comparison, Russia’s import of metalworking machine tools manufactured by Japanese corporation Tsugami in 2020-2021 fluctuated at the level of $2-3 million, while in 2023 it was already over $50 million, and in 2024 – over $60 million. Moreover, almost all of them were unused.

According to Financial Times, Tsugami relies on the Chinese market. Over 100,000 company lathes operate in China out of about 200,000 worldwide, and in 2023 over 60% of the corporation’s sales were in China. From June 2024, Japan imposed sanctions against several dozen Chinese companies that help Russia supply Japanese components, but lathe suppliers with CNC are not among them.

The largest distributor of Tsugami lathes from China to Russia in 2024 became Ele Technology. At least this was the case until October, when the company came under American sanctions. In less than 10 months, the company shipped lathes and components worth $49 million to Russia. Other major players include Shenzhen Yile Equipment ($5 million), Lewin Limited ($4 million), and Grun Group Limited ($1.2 million).

A significant portion of suppliers conduct no other business except trade with Russian distributors and have several signs of fictitiousness. Most of them began business activity after 2022. Ele Technology was registered on April 14, 2022, and previously tried to pass itself off as American company Gray Machinery. Shenzhen Yile Equipment doesn’t even have its own website.

Several small traders don’t particularly try to hide their connections with Russia. For example, one company is named Kalinka (russian word – ed.) Tianjin International Trading Company Limited.

Shaheds, Aircraft Onboard Systems, Missile Guidance Systems – What is Manufactured with Japanese Machine Tools

However, all these companies are just links in the chain of intermediaries. Much more interesting is where these products ultimately ended up. The lion’s share of these lathes can be found in Russian military factories.

In Russia in 2024, Japanese lathes were mainly bought by the large Russian company LLC “AMG” (Alpha Machinery Group), which purchased 88% of all supplies for $55.6 million. The first sanctions on “AMG” were imposed by the USA in late 2023, later joined by the EU. However, this doesn’t seem to particularly hinder the company, as Chinese companies continue selling it products from advanced countries. In 2024, the company earned 11.7 billion rubles (about $85 million) and increased its revenue almost 6 times compared to the previous year, and the number of lathes the distributor supplies per year is counted in hundreds.

In rare cases, some end users independently bought goods. For example, JSC “OKB Aerospace Systems” or JSC “Dubna Cable Plant,” which bought lathes from Shenzhen xingding machinery limited. The ordering companies are part of “Promtech” corporation, which Trap Aggressor wrote about earlier. The corporation manufactures components used in tanks, “Geran” UAVs (Shahed-136), Kh-59 missiles, and onboard systems for helicopters and aircraft.

Russian factories definitely purchased some lathes before the full-scale invasion, but it’s impossible to reliably establish delivery dates for most. Back in 2017, CNC lathes were ordered by Kazan LLC “Radiopribor,” which specializes in developing and serial production of aviation navigation radar complexes and onboard computing systems. In December 2022, the B0206 turning lathe was purchased by Saransk Mechanical Plant, which manufactures detonating mechanisms.

The vast majority of military enterprises that ultimately receive these lathes are involved either in developing onboard systems for aircraft or manufacturing missiles and air defense control systems.

From Russian job aggregators, one can learn that Japanese lathes are present at PJSC “Techpribor,” an aviation instrumentation enterprise that also develops fuel control equipment for small missile ships. They’re also looking for an operator for a lathe at Research Institute “Vector,” which develops a large amount of radio equipment for all federal departments and ministries of Russia.

This also includes Rybinsk Instrument Plant (JSC “RZP”), which is part of the management circuit of “Vega” concern of “Rostec” holding and specializes in onboard radio-electronic equipment, particularly measuring and telemetric complexes for aircraft and helicopters.

JSC “Ramenskoye Instrument Design Bureau” (RPKB) works in the same segment as part of “Rostec” concern. Its onboard equipment complexes are installed on a number of Russian helicopters and aircraft for civilian and dual-use purposes; key partners include “KRET,” “Russian Helicopters,” and “Rosoboronexport.”

One of LLC “AMG’s” buyers is JSC “Corporation Kometa,” which develops surveillance and ballistic missile detection systems, and private defense company CJSC “Lomo Laser” (2 lathes). “Kometa,” according to its website, produces optical and thermal homing heads for precision weapons, surveillance devices, information systems for laser and optical information processing, widely used in practically all types of military equipment of the Russian Federation Armed Forces. The company also notes that since 2022, state defense orders have increased 3-4 times, and contracts are concluded until 2027.

Based on court documents, another Tsugami JG-510CM lathe could have been “lost” in Ryazan at 6 Vysokovol’tnaya Street, where the “Globus” design bureau is located. The control systems of this bureau equip practically all main missile weapon systems (S-200/300/300V/400, Buk-M1/M2, Tor-M1, RTC-181, “Pantsir-S,” aviation guided weapons, underwater weapons “Paket,” “Lasta,” and aviation anti-submarine missile APR-3M).